Sir Nicholas Pumfrey, who has died aged 56 of a stroke, was appointed to the court of appeal in November, so becoming Lord Justice Pumfrey. His expertise lay in intellectual property, having served previously as a chancery judge for a little more than 10 years.

The son of a solicitor, he was educated at St Edward's school, Oxford, and then St Edmund Hall, where he graduated in physics in 1972 and then law in 1974. He went on to the bar, being called by Middle Temple in 1975. There followed a search for pupillage at the patent bar. One prominent set of chambers rejected him, to its permanent chagrin. Wiser counsel prevailed in the chambers of Stephen Gratwick QC, the then doyen of the patent bar, who took him on. His master was not particularly busy or successful, so Nicholas largely had to teach himself. But that is just what he was really good at.

He took silk in 1990 and was appointed a high court judge in 1997 at the early age of 46. From then until his appointment to the court of appeal, he was a nominated judge of the patents court.

Nicholas was a superb intellectual property lawyer, dealing with patents, trademarks, designs, copyright and suchlike. But he was much more of an all-rounder than that. There was hardly an area of law where he did not have an insight and wisdom. For instance, when he had been a judge for only a short while, he found himself having to decide whether the accountants KPMG should be restrained from acting for the Brunei Investment Authority on the grounds that it also acted for a member of the Brunei royal family, Prince Jefri. The prince's contention, that there was a risk of a conflict of interest, was upheld by Nicholas. The court of appeal reversed his ruling, but this was in turn reversed by the House of Lords. It was a resounding vindication of Nicholas's inbuilt sense of what was fair. I rang him up when the report of the lords' decision appeared, saying: "I bet you are grinning from ear to ear." "Well, yes I am, actually," was the answer.

Nicholas was known throughout the world by the intellectual property community. He was a regular speaker at the largest intellectual property conference, held annually at Fordham University, New York, and for the last few years taught patent law for a week at the prestigious Max Plank Institute in Munich. He was the first British judge to be made a member of the enlarged board of appeal (the top tribunal) of the European patent office in Munich.

He was also a prominent and active member of Middle Temple, chairing in succession the catering and finance committees. Although he said he did not want the job, it seems unlikely that his fellow benchers would have allowed him to refuse to become treasurer in due course.

Publicly, his loss will matter a lot. The court of appeal needed another intellectual property judge, especially for the highly complex, technical patent cases that have recently become more common. To the regular diet of pharmaceuticals has been added much litigation about electronics, particularly telephone and communication systems (his last judgment at first instance, handed down on December 20, was about patents said to be essential for 3G mobile telephones).

Europe will miss his wisdom too. The European commission is once again engaged in a project to create a patent court after repeated failures, generally for lack of consultation. Nicholas was taking an active part in the discussions. He was, for instance, a speaker at a meeting held in October 2006 by the French cour de cassation on the subject, and, with his experience and near fluent French, he was much wanted.

His command of technology was extraordinary. He could do his own plumbing, fix his motorbike, he kept bees, he could find truffles unaided by dog or pig, and he was also a first-class cook. When younger, he crossed France several times by bicycle - it would have been better for his health had he continued to cycle rather than always use his BMW motorbike, and what he called his "bread delivery van" in France. He was proud to have cycled up Mont Ventoux from both the north and south.

Nicholas had many friends within the law and outside but he kept his relationships in distinct compartments. The consensus was that despite his enormous warmth, humour and generosity, he was afflicted by a deep-rooted and wholly unjustified lack of self-confidence. He was simply shy.

Those in each of his compartments will miss him greatly, and the court of appeal has lost what surely would have been an outstanding member. He is survived by his mother, Maureen, and sister, Clare.

Louis Blom-Cooper writes: If the judicial appointments commission has been actively considering high-calibre candidates for the membership of the new supreme court of the United Kingdom (due to begin its life in October 2009), Nick Pumfrey must undoubtedly have been on the list of frontrunners. As the patent judge from 1997 onwards, he demonstrated a wide range of talents that go to make up the high quality of judicial attributes - patient listening, quick appreciation of the disputed issues, a happy temperament, an insistence in judgment-writing on conciseness and clarity. His promotion to the court of appeal was professionally acclaimed, with the prospect of further preferment. The loss to the legal world is huge.

Jonathan Fryer writes: Nick Pumfrey stood out among the 1969 intake at St Edmund Hall, Oxford, not just because of his bulk, but also his manner. At 18, he was self-assuredly brilliant. There was something about him which made him a sort of father confessor to several of us fellow students; he would listen gravely to our amorous exploits and proffer advice.

Nearly four decades on, at the bar of the Garrick, he had hardly changed physically: expansive, generous, and with a mischievous glint in his eye. He was half-amused, half-outraged when a man sitting next to him mistook him for the actor Richard Griffiths.

He was what used to be aptly termed a confirmed bachelor, eschewing intimate relationships. The last time I saw him, he surprised me by declaring wistfully that there were times when he wished he had given his feelings free rein, before adding, typically: "But then again, remembering you at Oxford... maybe not!"

· Nicholas Richard Pumfrey, barrister and judge, born May 22 1951; died December 24 2007